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POPE JOAN
A N O V E L

DO N N A WO O L F O L K C R O S S
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either

are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely
coincidental.

Copyright © 1996, 2009 by Donna Woolfolk Cross

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Three Rivers Press, an imprint of the
Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com

Three Rivers Press and the Tugboat design are registered trademarks of
Random House, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cross, Donna Woolfolk.
Pope Joan / Donna Cross.—1st Three Rivers Press ed.
Originally published: New York : Crown, © 1996.
1. Joan (Legendary Pope)—Fiction. 2. Popes—Legends—
Fiction. I. Title.
ps3553.r572p66 2009
813'.6—dc22 2008051919

isbn 978-0-307-45236-8

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

First Three Rivers Press Edition

www.ThreeRiversPress.com
 To purchase a copy of 

Pope Joan 
 
visit one of these online retailers: 
 
Amazon 
Barnes & Noble 
Borders 
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Powell’s Books 
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For my father,

W i l l i a m Wo o l f o l k ,

and there are no words

to add

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Prologue

I T WAS the twenty-eighth day of Wintarmanoth in the year of our

Lord 814, the harshest winter in living memory.
Hrotrud, the village midwife of Ingelheim, struggled through the
snow toward the canon’s grubenhaus. A gust of wind swept through
the trees and drove icy fingers into her body, searching the holes and
patches of her thin woolen garments. The forest path was deeply
drifted; with each step, she sank almost to her knees. Snow caked her
eyebrows and eyelashes; she kept wiping her face to see. Her hands
and feet ached with cold, despite the layers of linen rags she had
wrapped around them.
A blur of black appeared on the path ahead. It was a dead crow.
Even those hardy scavengers were dying this winter, starved because
their beaks could not tear the flesh of the frozen carrion. Hrotrud
shivered and quickened her pace.
Gudrun, the canon’s woman, had gone into labor a month sooner
than expected. A fine time for the child to come, Hrotrud thought bit-
terly. Five children delivered in the last month alone, and not one of
them lasted more than a week.
A blast of wind-driven snow blinded Hrotrud, and for a moment
she lost sight of the poorly marked path. She felt a swell of panic.
More than one villager had died that way, wandering in circles only a
short distance from their homes. She forced herself to stand still as
the snow swirled around her, surrounding her in a featureless land-
scape of white. When the wind let up, she could just make out the
outline of the path. Again she began to move forward. She no longer
felt pain in her hands and feet; they had gone completely numb. She
knew what that could mean, but she could not afford to dwell on it; it
was important to remain calm.
I must think of something besides the cold.
She pictured the home in which she had been raised, a casa with a
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2 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

prosperous manse of some six hectares. It was warm and snug, with
walls of solid timber, far nicer than their neighbors’ homes, made of
simple wooden lathes daubed with mud. A great fire had blazed in
the central hearth, the smoke spiraling up to an opening in the roof.
Hrotrud’s father had worn an expensive vest of otter skins over his
fine linen bliaud, and her mother had had silken ribbons for her long,
black hair. Hrotrud herself had had two large-sleeved tunics, and a
warm mantle of the finest wool. She remembered how soft and
smooth the expensive material had felt against her skin.
It had all ended so quickly. Two summers of drought and a kill-
ing frost ruined the harvest. Everywhere people were starving; in
Thuringia there were rumors of cannibalism. Through the judicious
sale of the family possessions, Hrotrud’s father had kept them from
hunger for a while. Hrotrud had cried when they took away her
woolen mantle. It had seemed to her then that nothing worse could
happen. She was eight years old; she did not yet comprehend the hor-
ror and cruelty of the world.
She pushed her way through another large drift of snow, fighting
off a growing light-headedness. It had been several days since she had
had anything to eat. Ah, well. If all goes well, I will feast tonight. Per-
haps, if the canon is well pleased, there will even be some bacon to
take home. The idea gave her renewed energy.
Hrotrud emerged into the clearing. She could see the blurred out-
lines of the grubenhaus just ahead. The snow was deeper here, be-
yond the screen of trees, but she drove ahead, plowing through with
her strong thighs and arms, confident now that safety was near.
Arriving at the door, she knocked once, then immediately let her-
self in; it was too cold to worry about social courtesies. Inside, she
stood blinking in darkness. The single window of the grubenhaus had
been boarded up for winter; the only light came from the hearth fire
and a few smoky tallows scattered about the room. After a moment,
her eyes began to adjust, and she saw two young boys seated close to-
gether near the hearth fire.
“Has the child come?” Hrotrud asked.
“Not yet,” answered the older boy.
Hrotrud muttered a short prayer of thanks to St. Cosmas, patron
saint of midwives. She had been cheated of her pay that way more
than once, turned away without a denar for the trouble she had taken
to come.

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P O P E J OA N 3

At the hearth fire, she peeled the frozen rags from her hands and
feet, crying out in alarm when she saw their sickly blue-white color.
Holy Mother, do not let the frost take them. The village would have
little use for a crippled midwife. Elias the shoemaker had lost his
livelihood that way. After he was caught in a storm on his way back
from Mainz, the tips of his fingers had blackened and dropped off in
a week. Now, gaunt and ragged, he squatted by the church doors,
begging his living off the charity of others.
Shaking her head grimly, Hrotrud pinched and rubbed her
numbed fingers and toes as the two boys watched in silence. The
sight of them reassured her. It will be an easy birth, she told herself,
trying to keep her mind off poor Elias. After all, I delivered Gudrun
of these two easily enough. The older boy must be almost six winters
now, a sturdy child with a look of alert intelligence. The younger, his
round-cheeked, three-year-old brother, rocked back and forth, suck-
ing his thumb morosely. Both were darkavised, like their father; nei-
ther had inherited their Saxon mother’s extraordinary white-gold
hair.
Hrotrud remembered how the village men had stared at Gudrun’s
hair when the canon had brought her back from one of his mission-
ary trips to Saxony. It had caused quite a stir at first, the canon’s tak-
ing a woman. Some said it was against the law, that the Emperor had
issued an edict forbidding men of the Church to take wives. But oth-
ers said it could not be so, for it was plain that without a wife a man
was subject to all kinds of temptation and wickedness. Look at the
monks of Stablo, they said, who shame the Church with their forni-
cations and drunken revelry. And certainly it was true that the canon
was a sober and hardworking man.
The room was warm. The large hearth was piled high with thick
logs of birch and oak; smoke rose in great billows to the hole in the
thatched roof. It was a snug dwelling. The wooden timbers that
formed the walls were heavy and thick, and the gaps between them
were tightly packed with straw and clay to keep out the cold. The sin-
gle window had been boarded over with sturdy planks of oak, an
extra measure of protection against the nordostroni, the frigid north-
east winds of winter. The house was large enough to be divided into
three separate compartments, one containing the sleeping quarters of
the canon and his wife, one for the animals that sheltered there in
harsh weather—Hrotrud heard the soft scuffle and scrape of their

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4 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

hooves to her left—and this one, the central room, where the family
worked and ate and the children slept. Other than the stone castle of
the Emperor, still unfinished and therefore rarely inhabited, no one in
Ingelheim had a finer home.
Hrotrud’s limbs began to prickle and throb with renewed sensa-
tion. She examined her fingers; they were rough and dry, but the
bluish cast had receded, supplanted by a returning glow of healthy
reddish pink. She sighed with relief, resolving to make an offering to
St. Cosmas in thanksgiving. For a few more minutes, Hrotrud lin-
gered by the fire, enjoying its warmth; then, with a nod and an en-
couraging pat for the boys, she hurried around the partition to where
the laboring woman was waiting.
Gudrun lay on a bed of peat topped with fresh straw. The canon,
a dark-haired man with thick, beetling eyebrows that gave him a per-
petually stern expression, sat apart. He nodded at Hrotrud, then re-
turned his attention to the large wood-bound book on his lap.
Hrotrud had seen the book on previous visits to the cottage, but the
sight of it still filled her with awe. It was a copy of the Holy Bible, and
it was the only book she had ever seen. Like the other villagers,
Hrotrud could neither read nor write. She knew, however, that the
book was a treasure, worth more in gold solidi than the entire village
earned in a year. The canon had brought it with him from his native
England, where books were not so rare as in Frankland.
Hrotrud saw immediately that Gudrun was in a bad way. Her
breathing was shallow, her pulse dangerously rapid, her whole body
puffed and swollen. The midwife recognized the signs. There was no
time to waste. She reached into her sack and took out a quantity of
dove’s dung that she had carefully collected in the fall. Returning to
the hearth, she threw the dung on the fire, watching with satisfaction
as the dark smoke began to rise, clearing the air of evil spirits.
She would have to ease the pain so Gudrun could relax and bring
the child forth. For that, she would use henbane. She took a bundle of
the small, yellow, purple-veined flowers, placed them in a clay mor-
tar, and skillfully ground them into powder, wrinkling her nose at the
acrid odor that was released. Then she infused the powder into a cup
of strong red wine and brought it to Gudrun to drink.
“What is that you mean to give her?” the canon asked abruptly.
Hrotrud started; she had almost forgotten he was there. “She is

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P O P E J OA N 5

weakened from the labor. This will relieve her pain and help the child
issue forth.”
The canon frowned. He took the henbane from Hrotrud’s hands,
strode around the partition, and threw it into the fire, where it hissed
briefly and then vanished. “Woman, you blaspheme.”
Hrotrud was aghast. It had taken her weeks of painstaking search
to gather that small amount of the precious medicine. She turned to-
ward the canon, ready to vent her anger, but stopped when she saw
the flinty look in his eyes.
“It is written”—he thumped the book with his hand for empha-
sis—“ ‘In sorrow shalt thou bring forth children.’ Such medicine is
unholy!”
Hrotrud was indignant. There was nothing unchristian about her
medicine. Didn’t she recite nine paternosters each time she pulled one
of the plants from the earth? The canon certainly never complained
when she gave him henbane to ease the pain of his frequent
toothaches. But she would not argue with him. He was an influential
man. One word from him about “unholy” practices, and Hrotrud
would be ruined.
Gudrun moaned in the throes of another pain. Very well, Hrotrud
thought. If the canon would not allow the henbane, she would have
to try another approach. She went to her sack and withdrew a long
piece of cloth, cut to the True Length of Christ. Moving with brisk ef-
ficiency, she wound it tightly around Gudrun’s abdomen. Gudrun
groaned when Hrotrud shifted her. Movement was painful for her,
but that could not be helped. Hrotrud took from her sack a small
parcel, carefully wrapped in a scrap of silken fabric for protection.
Inside was one of her treasures—the anklebone of a rabbit killed on
Christmas Day. She had begged it off one of the Emperor’s hunting
party the previous winter. With utmost care, Hrotrud shaved off
three thin slices and placed them in Gudrun’s mouth.
“Chew these slowly,” she instructed Gudrun, who nodded
weakly. Hrotrud settled back to wait. From the corner of her eye, she
studied the canon, who frowned in concentration on his book till his
brows almost met over the bridge of his nose.
Gudrun moaned again and twisted in pain, but the canon did not
look up. He’s a cold one, Hrotrud reflected. Still, he must have some
fire in his loins, or he wouldn’t have taken her to wife.

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6 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

How long had it been since the canon brought the Saxon woman
home, ten—or was it eleven?—winters ago. Gudrun had not been
young, by Frankish standards, perhaps twenty-three or twenty-four
years old, but she was very beautiful, with the long white-gold hair
and blue eyes of the aliengenae. She had lost her entire family in the
massacre at Verden. Thousands of Saxons had died that day rather
than accept the truth of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Mad barbarians,
Hrotrud thought. It wouldn’t have happened to me. She would have
sworn to whatever they asked of her, would do it now for that matter,
should the barbarians ever sweep through Frankland again, swear to
whatever strange and terrible gods they wished. It changed nothing.
Who was to know what went on in a person’s heart? A wise woman
kept her own counsel.
The fire sparked and flickered; it was burning low. Hrotrud
crossed to the pile of wood stacked in the corner, chose two good-
sized logs of birch, and put them on the hearth. She watched as they
settled, hissing, into the fire, the flames licking upwards around
them. Then she turned to check on Gudrun.
It was a full half hour since Gudrun had taken the shavings of
rabbit bone, but there was no change in her condition. Even that
strong medicine had failed to take effect. The pains remained erratic
and ineffectual, and Gudrun was weakening.
Hrotrud sighed wearily. Clearly, she would have to resort to
stronger measures.

The canon proved to be a problem when Hrotrud told him she

would need help with the birthing.
“Send for the village women,” he said peremptorily.
“Ah, sir, that is impossible. Who is there to send?” Hrotrud raised
her palms expressively. “I cannot go, for your wife needs me here. Your
elder boy cannot go, for though he seems a likely lad, he could get lost
in weather such as this. I almost did myself.”
The canon glared at her from under his dark brows. “Very well,”
he said, “I will go.” As he rose from his chair, Hrotrud shook her
head impatiently.
“It would do no good. By the time you returned, it would be too
late. It is your help I need, and quickly, if you wish your wife and
babe to live.”
“My help? Are you mad, midwife? That”—he motioned distaste-

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P O P E J OA N 7

fully toward the bed—“is women’s business, and unclean. I will have
nothing to do with it.”
“Then your wife will die.”
“That is in God’s hands, not mine.”
Hrotrud shrugged. “It is all one to me. But you will not find it
easy, raising two children without a mother.”
The canon stared at Hrotrud. “Why should I believe you? She’s
given birth before with no trouble. I have fortified her with my
prayers. You cannot know that she will die.”
This was too much. Canon or not, Hrotrud would not tolerate his
questioning her skill as a midwife. “It is you who know nothing,” she
said sharply. “You have not even looked at her. Go see her now; then
tell me that she is not dying.”
The canon went to the bed and looked down at his wife. Her
damp hair was pasted to her skin, which had turned yellowish white,
her dark-rimmed eyes were hollow and sunken into her head; but for
the long, unsteady exhalation of breath, she might have been already
dead.
“Well?” prodded Hrotrud.
The canon wheeled to face her. “God’s blood, woman! Why
didn’t you bring the women with you?”
“As you said yourself, sir, your wife’s given birth before without a
speck of trouble. There was no reason to expect any this time. Be-
sides, who would have come in weather such as this?”
The canon stalked to the hearth and paced back and forth agitat-
edly. At last he halted. “What do you want me to do?”
Hrotrud smiled broadly. “Oh, little enough, sir, little enough.” She
led him back to the bed. “For a start, help get her up.”
Standing on either side of Gudrun, they grabbed her under the
arms and heaved. Her body was heavy, but together they managed to
lift her to her feet, where she swayed against her husband. The canon
was stronger than Hrotrud had thought. That was good, for she
would need all his strength for what came next.
“We must force the babe down into position. When I give the
command, lift her as high as you can. And shake hard.”
The canon nodded, his mouth set grimly. Gudrun hung like a
dead weight between them, her head fallen forward on her chest.
“Lift!” shouted Hrotrud. They hoisted Gudrun by the arms and
began to shake her up and down. Gudrun screamed and fought to

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8 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

free herself. Pain and fear gave her surprising strength; the two of
them were hard put to restrain her. If only he had let me give her the
henbane, Hrotrud thought. She would be half-sensible by now.
Quickly they lowered her, but she continued to struggle and cry
out. Hrotrud gave a second command, and again they hoisted, shook,
then lowered Gudrun to the bed, where she lay half-fainting, mur-
muring in her barbarous native tongue. Good, Hrotrud thought. If I
move quickly, it will all be over before she regains her senses.
Hrotrud reached into the birth passage, probing for the opening
to the womb. It was rigid and swollen from the long hours of ineffec-
tual labor. Using her right index fingernail, which she kept long for
just this purpose, Hrotrud tore at the resistant tissue. Gudrun
groaned, then went completely limp. Warm blood poured over
Hrotrud’s hand, down her arms, and onto the bed. At last she felt the
opening give way. With an exultant cry, Hrotrud reached in and took
hold of the baby’s head, exerting a gentle downward pressure.
“Take her by the shoulders and pull against me,” she instructed
the canon, whose face had gone quite pale. Nevertheless he obeyed;
Hrotrud felt the pressure increase as the canon added his strength to
hers. After a few minutes, the baby started to move down into the
birth passage. She kept pulling steadily, careful not to injure the soft
bones of the child’s head and neck. At last the crown of the babe’s
head appeared, covered with a mass of fine, wet hair. Hrotrud eased
the head out gently, then turned the body to permit the right shoulder,
then the left, to emerge. One last, firm tug and the small body slid
wetly into Hrotrud’s waiting arms.
“A girl,” Hrotrud announced. “A strong one too, by the look of
her,” she added, noting with approval the infant’s lusty cry and
healthy pink color.
She turned to meet the canon’s disapproving stare.
“A girl,” he said. “So it was all for nothing.”
“Do not say so, sir.” Hrotrud was suddenly fearful that the
canon’s disappointment might mean less for her to eat. “The child is
healthy and strong. God grant that she live to do credit to your
name.”
The canon shook his head. “She is a punishment from God. A
punishment for my sins—and hers.” He motioned toward Gudrun,
who lay motionless. “Will she live?”
“Yes.” Hrotrud hoped that she sounded convincing. She could

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not afford to let the canon think he might be doubly disappointed.

She still hoped to taste meat that night. And there was, after all, a rea-
sonable chance that Gudrun would survive. True, the birthing had
been violent. After such an ordeal, many a woman came down with
fever and the wasting disease. But Gudrun was strong; Hrotrud
would treat her wound with a salve of mugwort mixed in fox’s
grease. “Yes, God willing, she will live,” she repeated firmly. She did
not feel it necessary to add that she would probably bear no more
children.
“That’s something, then,” the canon said. He moved to the bed
and stood looking down at Gudrun. Gently he touched the white-
gold hair, darkened now with sweat. For a moment, Hrotrud thought
he was going to kiss Gudrun. Then his expression changed; he looked
stern, even angry.
“Per mulierem culpa successit,” he said. “Sin came through a
woman.” He dropped the lock of hair and stepped back.
Hrotrud shook her head. Something from the Holy Book, no
doubt. The canon was a strange one, all right, but that was none of
her affair, God be thanked. She hurried to finish cleaning the blood
and birth fluids off Gudrun so she could start back home while there
was still daylight.
Gudrun opened her eyes and saw the canon standing over her.
The beginnings of a smile froze on her lips as she saw the expression
in his eyes.
“Husband?” she said doubtfully.
“A girl,” the canon said coldly, not troubling to hide his
displeasure.
Gudrun nodded, understanding, then turned her face to the wall.
The canon turned to go, stopping briefly to glance at the infant al-
ready safely ensconced in her pallet of straw.
“Joan. She will be called Joan,” he announced, and abruptly left
the room.

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T HUNDER sounded, very near, and the child woke. She moved
in the bed, seeking the warmth and comfort of her older broth-
ers’ sleeping forms. Then she remembered. Her brothers were gone.
It was raining, a hard spring downpour that filled the night air
with the sweet-sour smell of newly plowed earth. Rain thudded on
the roof of the canon’s grubenhaus, but the thickly woven thatching
kept the room dry, except for one or two small places in the corners
where water first pooled and then trickled in slow, fat drops to the
beaten earth floor.
The wind rose, and a nearby oak began to tap an uneven rhythm
on the cottage walls. The shadow of its branches spilled into the
room. The child watched, transfixed, as the monstrous dark fingers
wriggled at the edges of the bed. They reached out for her, beckoning,
and she shrank back.
Mama, she thought. She opened her mouth to call out, then
stopped. If she made a sound, the menacing hand would pounce. She
lay frozen, unable to will herself to move. Then she set her small chin
resolutely. It had to be done, so she would do it. Moving with exqui-
site slowness, never taking her eyes off the enemy, she eased herself
off the bed. Her feet felt the cool surface of the earthen floor; the fa-
miliar sensation was reassuring. Scarcely daring to breathe, she
backed toward the partition behind which her mother lay sleeping.
Lightning flashed; the fingers moved and lengthened, following her.
She swallowed a scream, her throat tightening with the effort. She
forced herself to move slowly, not to break into a run.
She was almost there. Suddenly, a salvo of thunder crashed over-
head. At the same moment something touched her from behind. She
yelped, then turned and fled around the partition, stumbling over the
chair she had backed into.
This part of the house was dark and still, save for her mother’s
rhythmic breathing. From the sound, the child could tell she was
deeply asleep; the noise had not wakened her. She went quickly to the
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bed, lifted the woolen blanket, and slid under it. Her mother lay on
her side, lips slightly parted; her warm breath caressed the child’s
cheek. She snuggled close, feeling the softness of her mother’s body
through her thin linen shift.
Gudrun yawned and shifted position, roused by the movement. Her
eyes opened, and she regarded the child sleepily. Then, waking fully,
she reached out and put her arms around her daughter.
“Joan,” she chastised gently, her lips against the child’s soft hair.
“Little one, you should be asleep.”
Speaking quickly, her voice high and strained from fear, Joan told
her mother about the monster hand.
Gudrun listened, petting and stroking her daughter and murmur-
ing reassurances. Gently she ran her fingers over the child’s face, half-
seen in the darkness. She was not pretty, Gudrun reflected ruefully. She
looked too much like him, with his thick English neck and wide jaw. Her
small body was already stocky and heavyset, not long and graceful
like Gudrun’s people’s. But the child’s eyes were good, large and ex-
pressive and rich hued, green with dark gray smoke rings at the center.
Gudrun lifted a strand of Joan’s baby hair and caressed it, enjoying the
way it shone, white-gold, even in the darkness. My hair. Not the coarse
black hair of her husband or his cruel, dark people. My child. She
wrapped the strand around her forefinger and smiled. This one, at
least, is mine.
Soothed by her mother’s attentions, Joan relaxed. In playful imi-
tation, she began to tug at Gudrun’s long braid, loosening it till her
hair lay tumbled about her head. Joan marveled at it, spilling over the
dark woolen coverlet like rich cream. She had never seen her mother’s
hair unbound. At the canon’s insistence, Gudrun wore it always
neatly braided, hidden under a rough linen cap. A woman’s hair, her
husband said, is the net wherein Satan catches a man’s soul. And Gu-
drun’s hair was extraordinarily beautiful, long and soft and pure
white-gold, without a trace of gray, though she was now an old
woman of thirty-seven winters.
“Why did Matthew and John go away?” Joan asked suddenly.
Her mother had explained this to her several times, but Joan wanted
to hear it again.
“You know why. Your father took them with him on his mission-
ary journey.”
“Why couldn’t I go too?”

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12 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

Gudrun sighed patiently. The child was always so full of ques-

tions. “Matthew and John are boys; one day they will be priests like
your father. You are a girl, and therefore such matters do not concern
you.” Seeing that Joan was not content with that, she added, “Be-
sides, you are much too young.”
Joan was indignant. “I was four in Wintarmanoth!”
Gudrun’s eyes lit with amusement as she looked at the pudgy
baby face. “Ah, yes, I forgot, you are a big girl now, aren’t you? Four
years old! That does sound very grown-up.”
Joan lay quietly while her mother stroked her hair. Then she asked,
“What are heathens?” Her father and brothers had spoken a good deal
about heathens before they left. Joan did not understand what heathens
were, exactly, though she gathered it was something very bad.
Gudrun stiffened. The word had conjuring powers. It had been on
the lips of the invading soldiers as they pillaged her home and slaugh-
tered her family and friends. The dark, cruel soldiers of the Frankish
Emperor Karolus. “Magnus,” people called him now that he was
dead. “Karolus Magnus.” Charles the Great. Would they name him
so, Gudrun wondered, if they had seen his army tear Saxon babes
from their mothers’ arms, swinging them round before they dashed
their heads against the reddened stones? Gudrun withdrew her hand
from Joan’s hair and rolled onto her back.
“That is a question you must ask your father,” she said.
Joan did not understand what she had done wrong, but she heard
the strange hardness in her mother’s voice and knew that she would
be sent back to her own bed if she didn’t think of some way to repair
the damage. Quickly she said, “Tell me again about the Old Ones.”
“I cannot. Your father disapproves of the telling of such tales.”
The words were half statement, half question.
Joan knew what to do. Placing both hands solemnly over her
heart, she recited the Oath exactly as her mother had taught it to her,
promising eternal secrecy on the sacred name of Thor the Thunderer.
Gudrun laughed and drew Joan close again. “Very well, little
quail. I will tell you the story, since you know so well how to ask.”
Her voice was warm again, wistful and melodic as she began to
tell of Woden and Thor and Freya and the other gods who had peo-
pled her Saxon childhood before the armies of Karolus brought the
Word of Christ with blood and fire. She spoke liltingly of Asgard, the
radiant home of the gods, a place of golden and silver palaces, which

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P O P E J OA N 13

could only be reached by crossing Bifrost, the mysterious bridge of

the rainbow. Guarding the bridge was Heimdall the Watchman, who
never slept, whose ears were so keen he could even hear the grass
grow. In Valhalla, the most beautiful palace of all, lived Woden, the
father-god, on whose shoulders sat the two ravens Hugin, Thought,
and Munin, Memory. On his throne, while the other gods feasted,
Woden contemplated what Thought and Memory told him.
Joan nodded happily. This was her favorite part of the story. “Tell
about the Well of Wisdom,” she begged.
“Although he was already very wise,” explained her mother,
“Woden always sought greater wisdom. One day he went to the Well
of Wisdom, guarded by Mimir the Wise, and asked for a draft from
it. ‘What price will you pay?’ asked Mimir. Woden replied that Mimir
could ask what he wished. ‘Wisdom must always be bought with
pain,’ replied Mimir. ‘If you wish a drink of this water, you must pay
for it with one of your eyes.’ ”
Eyes bright with excitement, Joan exclaimed, “And Woden did it,
Mama, didn’t he? He did it!”
Her mother nodded. “Though it was a hard choice, Woden con-
sented to lose the eye. He drank the water. Afterward, he passed on to
mankind the wisdom he had gained.”
Joan looked up at her mother, her eyes wide and serious. “Would
you have done it, Mama—to be wise, to know about all things?”
“Only gods make such choices,” she replied. Then, seeing the
child’s persistent look of question, Gudrun confessed, “No. I would
have been too afraid.”
“So would I,” Joan said thoughtfully. “But I would want to do it.
I would want to know what the well could tell me.”
Gudrun smiled down at the intent little face. “Perhaps you would
not like what you would learn there. There is a saying among our
people. ‘A wise man’s heart is seldom glad.’ ”
Joan nodded, though she did not really understand. “Now tell
about the Tree,” she said, snuggling close to her mother again.
Gudrun began to describe Irminsul, the wondrous universe tree. It
had stood in the holiest of the Saxon groves at the source of the Lippe
River. Her people had worshiped at it until it was cut down by the
armies of Karolus.
“It was very beautiful,” her mother said, “and so tall that no one
could see the top. It—”

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14 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

She stopped. Suddenly aware of another presence, Joan looked

up. Her father was standing in the doorway.
Her mother sat up in bed. “Husband,” she said. “I did not look
for your return for another fortnight.”
The canon did not respond. He took a wax taper from the table
near the door and crossed to the hearth fire, where he plunged it into
the glowing embers until it flared.
Gudrun said nervously, “The child was frightened by the thunder.
I thought to comfort her with a harmless story.”
“Harmless!” The canon’s voice shook with the effort to control his
rage. “You call such blasphemy harmless?” He covered the distance to
the bed in two long strides, set down the taper, and pulled the blanket
off, exposing them. Joan lay with her arms around her mother, half-
hidden under a curtain of white-gold hair.
For a moment the canon stood stupefied with disbelief, looking at
Gudrun’s unbound hair. Then his fury overtook him. “How dare you!
When I have expressly forbidden it!” Taking hold of Gudrun, he
started to drag her from the bed. “Heathen witch!”
Joan clung to her mother. The canon’s face darkened. “Child, be-
gone!” he bellowed. Joan hesitated, torn between fear and the desire
somehow to protect her mother.
Gudrun pushed her urgently. “Yes, go. Go quickly.”
Releasing her hold, Joan dropped to the floor and ran. At the
door, she turned and saw her father grab her mother roughly by the
hair, wrenching her head back, forcing her to her knees. Joan started
back into the room. Terror stopped her short as she saw her father
withdraw his long, bone-handled hunting knife from his corded belt.
“Forsachistu diabolae?” he asked Gudrun in Saxon, his voice
scarcely more than a whisper. When she did not respond, he placed
the point of the knife against her throat. “Say the words,” he growled
menacingly. “Say them!”
“Ec forsacho allum diaboles,” Gudrun responded tearfully, her
eyes blazing defiance, “wuercum ende wuordum, thunaer ende
woden ende saxnotes ende allum . . .”
Rooted with fear, Joan watched her father pull up a heavy tress of
her mother’s hair and draw the knife across it. There was a ripping
sound as the silken strands parted; a long band of white gold floated
to the floor.

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P O P E J OA N 15

Clapping her hand over her mouth to stifle a sob, Joan turned
and ran.
In the darkness, she bumped into a shape that reached out for her.
She squealed in fear as it grabbed her. The monster hand! She had
forgotten about it! She struggled, pummeling at it with her tiny fists,
resisting with all her strength, but it was huge, and held her fast.
“Joan! Joan, it’s all right. It’s me!”
The words penetrated her fear. It was her ten-year-old brother
Matthew, who had returned with her father.
“We’ve come back. Joan, stop struggling! It’s all right. It’s me.”
Joan reached up, felt the smooth surface of the pectoral cross that
Matthew always wore, then slumped against him in relief.
Together they sat in the dark, listening to the soft, splitting sounds
of the knife ripping through their mother’s hair. Once they heard
Mama cry out in pain. Matthew cursed aloud. An answering sob
came from the bed where Joan’s seven-year-old brother, John, was
hiding under the covers.
At last the ripping sounds stopped. After a brief pause the canon’s
voice began to rumble in prayer. Joan felt Matthew relax; it was over.
She threw her arms around his neck and wept. He held her and
rocked her gently.
After a time, she looked up at him. “Father called Mama a heathen.”
“Yes.”
“She isn’t,” Joan said hesitantly, “is she?”
“She was.” Seeing her look of horrified disbelief, he added, “A
long time ago. Not anymore. But those were heathen stories she was
telling you.”
Joan stopped crying; this was interesting information.
“You know the first of the Commandments, don’t you?”
Joan nodded and recited dutifully, “Thou shalt have no other
gods before me.”
“Yes. That means that the gods Mama was telling you about are
false; it is sinful to speak of them.”
“Is that why Father—”
“Yes,” Matthew broke in. “Mama had to be punished for the
good of her soul. She was disobedient to her husband, and that also is
against the law of God.”
“Why?”

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16 DONNA WOOLFOLK CROSS

“Because it says so in the Holy Book.” He began to recite, “ ‘For

the husband is the head of the wife; therefore, let the wives submit
themselves unto their husbands in everything.’ ”
“Why?”
“Why?” Matthew was taken aback. No one had ever asked him
that before. “Well, I guess because . . . because women are by nature
inferior to men. Men are bigger, stronger, and smarter.”
“But—” Joan started to respond, but Matthew cut her off.
“Enough questions, little sister. You should be in bed. Come
now.” He carried her to the bed and placed her beside John, who was
already sleeping.
Matthew had been kind to her; to return the favor, Joan closed
her eyes and burrowed under the covers as if to sleep.
But she was far too troubled for sleep. She lay in the dark, peering
at John as he slept, his mouth hanging slackly open.
He can’t recite from the Psalter and he’s seven years old. Joan was
only four, but she already knew the first ten psalms by heart.
John wasn’t smart. But he was a boy. Yet how could Matthew
be wrong? He knew everything; he was going to be a priest, like their
father.
She lay awake in the dark, turning the problem over in her mind.
Toward dawn she slept, restlessly, troubled by dreams of mighty
wars between jealous and angry gods. The angel Gabriel himself
came from Heaven with a flaming sword to do battle with Thor and
Freya. The battle was terrible and fierce, but in the end the false gods
were driven back, and Gabriel stood triumphant before the gates of
paradise. His sword had disappeared; in his hand gleamed a short,
bone-handled knife.

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About the Author © isolde ohlbaum

A New York City native, Donna Woolfolk Cross

graduated cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, from the Univer-
sity of Pennsylvania in 1969 with a B.A. in English. She
moved to London, England, after graduation and worked
in a small publishing house on Fleet Street, W. H. Allen
and Company. Upon her return to the United States, Cross
worked at Young and Rubicam, a Madison Avenue adver-
tising firm, before going on to graduate school at UCLA
where she earned a master’s degree in literature and writ-
ing in 1972.
In 1973, Cross moved to Upstate New York and be-
gan teaching writing at an upstate New York college. She
is the author of two books on language, Word Abuse and
Mediaspeak, and coauthor of the college textbook Speak-
ing of Words. The product of seven years of research and
writing, Pope Joan is her first novel. Cross is at work on a
new novel set in seventeenth-century France.

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